Magnetometers are used in portable electronic devices to provide directional information. Because the physical space inside such devices is small, the magnetometer used in them must be sized accordingly. As such, integrated circuit magnetometers are used because very small sensors can be fabricated.
One limitation of integrated circuit magnetometers is that three dimensional sensors cannot currently be fabricated on a single die. Instead, separate sensor die must be orthogonally arranged and assembled together to form a three dimensional sensor device. Typically, this arrangement requires at least one of the die to be rotated so that its active circuit is perpendicular to a non-rotated die. This creates the need to electrically connect surfaces that are perpendicular to each other, which is both difficult and expensive using current technologies.
For the reasons stated above and for other reasons stated below which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the specification, there is a need in the art for improved systems and methods for three dimensional sensors.